Join the Melbourne History Workshop in the School of Historical and Philosophical Studies, University of Melbourne (melbournehistoryworkshop.com) in documenting these challenging times in Melbourne and around the globe. We are working with Mark Tebeau from Arizona State University and others by acting not just as historians, but as chroniclers, recorders, memoirists, as image collectors. We invite you to share your experience and impressions of how CoVid19 has affected our lives, from the mundane to the extraordinary, including the ways things haven't changed at all. Share your story in text, images, video, tweets, texts, Facebook posts, Instagram or Snapchat memes, and screenshots of the news and emails--anything that speaks to paradoxes of the moment. Imagine, as we are, what future historians might need to write about and understand this historical moment.
For specific information about Melbourne contributions and how you can participate, please contact Professor Andy May: a.may AT unimelb.edu.au or one of our Melbourne curators.
For further information about the broader initiative contact Professor Mark Tebeau, or one of our curators.
What Stories to Share?
- Images: photographs, screen captures (including from your phone or laptop) of social media, media, communications, memes, and other expressions of the moment
- Audio histories
- Video clips--taken of the world, including yourself speaking, or of social media memes </li>
- Links
- Text
- Files: emails, announcements, text messages, scientific documents, and flyers
Allow this Journal of the Plague Year to become your personal diary--a place where you share moments of your life, along with hundreds of others to create a historical record of the pandemic.
We imagine that there will be both traumatic and dislocating moments in this year of the pandemic, and ask you to share as you encounter them. The same is true for moments of unexpected joy--of spending more time with family or friends. Your contributions can and should come from the landscapes of your daily life, both in suburbs and cities, but also through the social media and interwebs that increasingly connect us. Stories can be deeply personal, political, or mundane. Help your communities to understand the extraordinary, as well as the ordinary of this moment. In the future, historians will be able to use this record of daily life to better understand the changing nature of our lives.
The site title was inspired by Daniel Defoe's novel of that name. First published in March 1722 the novel, A Journal of the Plague Year, tells story of one man's experiences of the year 1665, in which the bubonic plague shook London.
A Journal of the Plague Year was initiated by Catherine O'Donnell, Richard Amesbury, and Mark Tebeau in the School for Historical, Philosophical, and Religious Studies at Arizona State University. The project is supported financially by the public history endowment at Arizona State University, a fund endowed by Noel Stowe.
Australian Collections include: